YA Novel ‘Wicked Lovely’ Gains Movie Momentum

The movie adaptation of the Melissa Marr novel Wicked Lovely has conjured up a second wind. Originally set up at Universal by Wild West Picture Show Productions, the project is now freed up and WWPSP has brought in indie production house Pukeko Pictures to produce and oversee special effects, and Weta Workshop for design and physical effects. They will set a director shortly and then CAA will shop the project.

WWPSP’s Vince Vaughn, Valeri Vaughn and Peter Billingsley are producing with Pukeko’s Martin Baynton and Adam Fratto, and Richard Taylor is exec producing. The project was grabbed back from turnaround by WWPSP, and it rears up again at a time when there is a strong market for female driven YA adaptations, after Divergent and The Fault In Our Stars. Marr’s book series has a global following and has been published in 26 languages. The script was written by Caroline Thompson, the scribe behind Edward Scissorhands and The Nightmare Before Christmas. In the novel, a teen girl who has seen dangerous faeries her entire life much suddenly go against everything she was taught to confront a world she was raised to fear.

Pukeko Pictures is co-owned by Baynton, Tania Rodger and Taylor, the latter an Oscar and BAFTA Award winner. New Zealand-based Weta has The Lord Of The Rings and Avatar among its credits. CAA brokered the book deal for Marr with Writers House, and the agency reps WWPSP and Pukeko Pictures.